The spreadsheet is fun aint it? This is unrelated, but... sometimes it does interesting things based upon the order that you put information into it. A couple days a ago I was putting a creature in it from B1, so I could then add classes to it, and I couldn't get the manufactured weapon and supplemental natural attacks to reconcile.. unless I put certain information in it in a specific order.

The optional encounter elements are directly from published material which don't include separate listing for maneuvers in which they're trained. As a GM I would prefer them there, however, I'm sure Mark could tell us it's "correct." pfft, whatever that means. ;-)

Was the an expectation to the contrary? ;-) I mean, you are tasked with traveling through a giant chunk of the Darklands ripped out off the earth hundreds of years ago and sent to a personal demiplane..

This was one of the most fun modules I've played. It was a challenge, and gave that glorious tension that *we might not win*. I wish that were in PFS more frequently.

Good GM too, btw.

That tension is incredibly difficult to design given the wide variety of PCs in PFS. I'm glad to hear that for you it worked well! I'm still anxiously awaiting the first time it falls on the dark side of fun.

p.s. Any Chelaxians at the table? Just curious what they think of their faction mission..

This was one of the most fun modules I've played. It was a challenge, and gave that glorious tension that *we might not win*. I wish that were in PFS more frequently.

Good GM too, btw.

That tension is incredibly difficult to design given the wide variety of PCs in PFS. I'm glad to hear that for you it worked well! I'm still anxiously awaiting the first time it falls on the dark side of fun.

p.s. Any Chelaxians at the table? Just curious what they think of their faction mission..

Yeah, I can sympathize with scenarios being hard to write for balance. That's the primary reason I advocate for GM empowerment. But you know, that's a whole other conversation. . . .

This scenario worked for us, but a lesser team would have been mindlessly slaughtered.

Most of the encounters in there have similar morale. IMO, most creatures aren't up for a fight the death if it can be avoided. Using "fights to the death" for the majority of encounters is a lazy cop-out.

Most of the encounters in there have similar morale. IMO, most creatures aren't up for a fight the death if it can be avoided. Using "fights to the death" for the majority of encounters is a lazy cop-out.

I think the nastiest part of this was the fight with the Dark Stalkers. Primarily, the fact that one of them was a spellcaster with access to dispel magic. Being able to eliminate the only defense we had against the deeper darkness (an oil of daylight) is just brutal.

Relatedly, given that any time deeper darkness comes up it seems to be at-will and with counter-countermeasures, is there any point in even carrying said oil of daylight? Is there some other, more reliable countermeasure my PCs could be carrying?

Well the oil of daylight does give you at least part of a round to see the field and what's going on. That can be valuable to use save or suck spells or grapple something. The best tactic would be to delay right behind whomever is using the daylight. Remember that as a SLA, they still need to make a concentration check if you're grappling them (or readying to stab them in the face)

Other countermeasures available at those levels would be casting a heightened daylight or any 4th level or higher spell that emits light (fire shield? although it's personal, so no potion/oil)

Lesser globe of invulnerability works well at least for the caster.

Having dispel magic ready to remove the darkness or counter a caster's dispel magic is a great option too for any caster vs. caster fight.

Being a rogue or barbarian helps too since they can't sneak you even though you can't see them.

Summon an earth elemental or another creature that doesn't need sight to help.

Did anyone enjoy picking that wand up off the chronicle sheet?

edit: I also pointed out that the Dark Slayer only has about a 60% chance of getting rid of your daylight depending on the caster's level. (I guess 70% for the oil which is probably CL 5). So there's a decent chance they fail and waste their turn doing so.

double edit: Wait, why am I giving advice making it easier for the players to survive? arggggh!

Relatedly, given that any time deeper darkness comes up it seems to be at-will and with counter-countermeasures, is there any point in even carrying said oil of daylight? Is there some other, more reliable countermeasure my PCs could be carrying?

Yeah, the lesson seems to be "don't bother, because if we want it to be dark, damnit, it will be dark."

The counter? Have every character take blind-fight and get true seeing.

Spoiler:

I ended up using a globe of lesser invulnerability and then hoped the creature couldn't escape.

Well the oil of daylight does give you at least part of a round to see the field and what's going on. That can be valuable to use save or suck spells or grapple something. The best tactic would be to delay right behind whomever is using the daylight. Remember that as a SLA, they still need to make a concentration check if you're grappling them (or readying to stab them in the face)

Other countermeasures available at those levels would be casting a heightened daylight or any 4th level or higher spell that emits light (fire shield? although it's personal, so no potion/oil)

Lesser globe of invulnerability works well at least for the caster.

Having dispel magic ready to remove the darkness or counter a caster's dispel magic is a great option too for any caster vs. caster fight.

Being a rogue or barbarian helps too since they can't sneak you even though you can't see them.

Summon an earth elemental or another creature that doesn't need sight to help.

Alas, not much of that helps with my fighter. ;) I guess I'll keep having my PCs carry an oil of daylight and hope that occasionally the users of deeper darkness won't also have dispel magic.

Quote:

Did anyone enjoy picking that wand up off the chronicle sheet?

We enjoyed finding it (and I totally plan to GM this at some point and credit my Eldritch Knight). But alas, we offered it as a bribe to the dragon, which ironically was wasted because we still came up short and had to fight her, but she still flew off with the treasure we'd offered up to that point. :(

Quote:

double edit: Wait, why am I giving advice making it easier for the players to survive? arggggh!

We enjoyed finding it (and I totally plan to GM this at some point and credit my Eldritch Knight). But alas, we offered it as a bribe to the dragon, which ironically was wasted because we still came up short and had to fight her, but she still flew off with the treasure we'd offered up to that point. :(

Unfortunately at higher levels the fighter often has to rely on casters to get through some of the challenges they face. It's much like the wizard needing the fighter to kill the orc at level 1 because 1d4+1 once ain't cutting it.

We enjoyed finding it (and I totally plan to GM this at some point and credit my Eldritch Knight). But alas, we offered it as a bribe to the dragon, which ironically was wasted because we still came up short and had to fight her, but she still flew off with the treasure we'd offered up to that point. :(

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You're GM's mean! I approve!

Meh, no skin of my back. Couldn't use the item anyway. ;)

And now I know that I absolutely MUST run this scenario at some point!

Relatedly, given that any time deeper darkness comes up it seems to be at-will and with counter-countermeasures, is there any point in even carrying said oil of daylight? Is there some other, more reliable countermeasure my PCs could be carrying?

Yeah, the lesson seems to be "don't bother, because if we want it to be dark, damnit, it will be dark."

What other adventures have deeper darkness and a counter for daylight?

Unfortunately at higher levels the fighter often has to rely on casters to get through some of the challenges they face. It's much like the wizard needing the fighter to kill the orc at level 1 because 1d4+1 once ain't cutting it.

Oh! I could carry scrolls of daylight (or dispel magic) to have the caster use! Thanks for the tip, ya old softie! ;)

Relatedly, given that any time deeper darkness comes up it seems to be at-will and with counter-countermeasures, is there any point in even carrying said oil of daylight? Is there some other, more reliable countermeasure my PCs could be carrying?

Yeah, the lesson seems to be "don't bother, because if we want it to be dark, damnit, it will be dark."

What other adventures have deeper darkness and a counter for daylight?

Note that darkness has a similar relationship to light that deeper darkness has to daylight in terms of how it screws parties at-tier.

Spoiler:

A quick check of the modules I have. . . . (and I may have missed some)
Rescue at Azlant Ridge, Part II (at will deeper darkness = AWDD)
Heresy of Man Part I (AWDD)
Rats of the Round Mountain Part I (AWDD)
Drow of the Darkland Pyramids (at will darkness + 1/day dd)
Darkest Vengeance (at will darkness, AWDD at tier 1-2 and 4-5)
Hall of Drunken Heroes (AWDD)
A few additional modules with 1/day deeper darkness for multiple creatures (per encounter) that I didn't bother with.
Several low level modules with at will darkness and 1/day darkness with multiple creatures in an encounter
Several clerics in modules with deeper darkness memorized twice, along with dispel magic memorized.

I don't mind (deeper) darkness in an adventure. What I mind is that it seems clear that unless you can do it at will, you'll lose the arms race. Which is still fine -- I just won't bother to waste money on purchasing one-time counters.

In this example the result is the normal lighting conditions. Daylight is still going. DD is still going from two locations. Where DD and Daylight overlap, it's normal lighting conditions. The only way a second casting of DD makes the room unnaturally dark again is if they ready to cast/use DD as a counterspell or use dispel magic to target the already on-going daylight.

The problem is not the at will on the deeper darkness, since don't the darkness and the daylight cancel each other out in the overlapping area and restore the original light conditions?

The problem is the same creature with at will darkness also having dispel. Usually the single countermeasure is enough to get you through the encounter, but when the dispel is in play, you better hope you have a sun domain cleric or something.

Last Resort:

You best bet if you are effectively blinded around a Dark Stalker is to start laying down Obscuring Mist and other fog effects to keep them from sneak attacking.

Jiggy, you might want to look into Riffle Scrolls which you can use in the dark since you activate it by flipping through a little booklet. I think they are PFS legal too.

The problem is not the at will on the deeper darkness, since don't the darkness and the daylight cancel each other out in the overlapping area and restore the original light conditions?

The problem is the same creature with at will darkness also having dispel. Usually the single countermeasure is enough to get you through the encounter, but when the dispel is in play, you better hope you have a sun domain cleric or something.

** spoiler omitted **

Jiggy, you might want to look into Riffle Scrolls which you can use in the dark since you activate it by flipping through a little booklet. I think they are PFS legal too.

Excellent post. If you are knowingly going into the Darklands, expect darkness... :D

In this example the result is the normal lighting conditions. Daylight is still going. DD is still going from two locations. Where DD and Daylight overlap, it's normal lighting conditions. The only way a second casting of DD makes the room unnaturally dark again is if they ready to cast/use DD as a counterspell or use dispel magic to target the already on-going daylight.

I see this run incorrectly all the time too. The trick is that you should use Round 2 of the NPC to dispel their daylight, just as you said. But any GM worth his/her salt ought to do that. The examples I listed above are capable of those tactics.

And there's also the slight issue that (depending on the GM), you may not be able to target any square within the deeper darkness when casting daylight. So some darkness would still linger unless the PCs dispelled instead of just casting it. (Assuming the radii of the two spells are the same, it would take two castings of daylight to "cover" the space of darkness: one to illuminate the center of the darkness effect so you can target it, and the second daylight centered on that point.)

Basically, even though I want to look on the bright side of life, I won't be able to. :)

When held between thumb and forefinger and riffled through in a quick manner, the motion of the pages turning activates the magic within, simultaneously completing casting of the spell and erasing the booklet.

... Activating a riffle scroll requires one free hand. A riffle scroll uses the normal casting time for the inscribed spell, even if the user or creator is of a class that has increased casting times when using metamagic effects.

Regular Scroll wrote:

Activating a scroll requires reading the spell from the scroll. The character must be able to see and read the writing on the scroll. Activating a scroll spell requires no material components or focus. (The creator of the scroll provided these when scribing the scroll.)

These rule suggest to me that you do not need to see it. Regular scrolls specify in their activation rules that you need to read it, riffle scrolls require only one free hand, which is further supported by the description of using a riffle scroll by flipping through the booklet.

What is your reasoning that you have to see it beyond the fact that it uses Silence Spell and not Still Spell? I'm not seeing your logic here.

If a party is facing these effects, a daylight spell even if it lasts a single round it still takes a round out from the enemy. At will power still take a standard action.

Scroll etc while handy have dc to overcome with dispell magic. Unless you are a specific user all hail the Pathfinder Savant class.

Then you have spells that specifically counter each other.

What makes this encounter so fun is there are 2 enemies. So while the PC's may feel that they may be on an uphill battle they really aren't, action economy is still favoring the Pc's.

While daylight is good countering darkness at higher levels players should have at hand a decent list of availabe consumable consumables.

I think when I ran this I had 1 deaper darkness up, from the beginning.

There were 2 dispel magic's cast one took out a deaper darkness another daylight then, then another deaper cast then a daylight that got countered by another deaper darkness.

A lesser globe of invulnerabitly ended up being the spell to trump the encouncter.

Again another side discussion, a dispel magic probably could not target a deeper darkness without an overlapping daylight. Since you would have to target the object or creature. An object out of LoS would be extremely hard to target and dispel, as well as darkness being used specifically to counter a daylight with a range of touch since it is range touch, with zero save.

The last thing I want to add about the daylight/deeper darkness is this:

If your players come up with a creative way or strategy to deal with the deeper darkness, go with it! Don't hose them because RAW and tactics make it possible. There's plenty of other deadliness in this scenario. :)

In this example the result is the normal lighting conditions. Daylight is still going. DD is still going from two locations. Where DD and Daylight overlap, it's normal lighting conditions. The only way a second casting of DD makes the room unnaturally dark again is if they ready to cast/use DD as a counterspell or use dispel magic to target the already on-going daylight.

Same amount of time has gone by and PC's are just as hosed on round 2.
I know since this is what killed my very first (and last) Cleric. (well it was the greataxe wielding rogue who did the killing immediately after but same thing).

Same amount of time has gone by and PC's are just as hosed on round 2.
I know since this is what killed my very first (and last) Cleric. (well it was the greataxe wielding rogue who did the killing immediately after but same thing).

Unless that NPC specially readies an action to counterspell (thus not acting in the surprise round), they can't "counter" the daylight spell. The result should be that the second deeper darkness in 1b does nothing.